“FROM THE INSIDE OUT” A report by the Prison Watch Community Oversight Initiative December 2016 Issue #1 This report was created by Program Director Bonnie Kerness (973-410-3978/
[email protected]), Interns Rachel Frome and Marshall Justice Rountree, and with further assistance from Jean Ross, Esq. and CLASP’s Kunal Sharma, Esq. and Billimarie Lubiano Robinson. Prison Watch Program 89 Market St, 6th Floor Newark, NJ 07102 (973) 643-3192 Dear Friends, This first issue of Inside Out: The Prison Watch Community Oversight Initiative, was suggested by the people confined in the NJ penal system a number of years ago to provide people in the community with specific examples of conditions in our state’s prisons. Their feeling - and ours - has been that this kind of initiative will enable more people to better understand the prison system, which is expensive, dysfunctional and largely concealed sector of our society. We believe that such understanding will enable and motivate communication and collaboration in order to more effectively address the problems emerging from these inside reports. We also hope that the connections we create will enable us to eventually serve as an Emergency Response Network, with the capacity to counter individual as well as systemic instances of harm, when the need arises. We think that the information that we distribute should prompt formal legislation that decrees independent prison oversight. The voices reflected in the reports below are those who have agreed to stay in touch with community-based advocates on a regular basis. They are giving us information regarding what is happening to and around them.